Nov. 27 (Bloomberg) -- Russian stocks fell for a third day
as oil, the nation’s chief export earner, declined, trimming
appetite for equities in the world’s biggest energy exporter.

The Micex Index lost 0.6 percent to 1,475.42 by the close
in Moscow, the lowest since Nov. 13 and poised for the biggest
monthly retreat since May. OAO Rosneft, the nation’s biggest oil
company, dropped 0.8 percent to 237.50 rubles, the lowest since
Aug. 27. Natural gas exporter OAO Gazprom slid 0.6 percent to
142 rubles. Coking-coal producer OAO Mechel, which is the worst
performer on the gauge this month with a 40 percent slump, lost
4.6 percent to 62.60 rubles.

Crude oil tumbled 1.5 percent to $92.31 in New York, a
fourth day of declines. Russia receives about half its budget
revenue from natural gas and oil sales. Most metals fell on the
London Metal Exchange, including tin and lead. The S&P GSCI
gauge of 24 commodities has declined 4.1 percent this year.

“We’re seeing a drop in oil, metal prices,” Oleg Popov,
who manages $1 billion of securities for Allianz Investments,
said by phone from Moscow. “It’s a correction trend -- we’ve
dropped for five days out of the past six. Investors are fixing
profits and falling crude is one of the factors.”

Rosneft and Gazprom have a combined weighting on the Micex
of about 19 percent.

Lukoil, Sberbank

OAO Lukoil, Russia’s second-biggest oil producer, fell 0.7
percent to 2,053.89 rubles. Lukoil’s net income in the third
quarter fell 12 percent to $3.11 billion from a year earlier as
gains on lower tax the previous year weren’t repeated, the
company said yesterday. That beat the $3.03 billion average
estimate of analysts surveyed by Bloomberg.

“Investors are taking the money out of riskier assets and
putting them into developed markets,” Yuri Selyandin, a
portfolio manager who helps manage about $2 billion at GHP Group
in Moscow, said by phone. “Russia’s growth rate is weak and
there’s fear that Russian companies won’t be able to show good
financial results in the future.”

OAO Sberbank, the nation’s biggest lender, closed 0.6
percent lower at 102.76 rubles. Its global depositary receipts
fell 1.4 percent to $12.42 in London. Net income at the Moscow-based bank climbed 8 percent to 94.6 billion rubles ($2.9
billion) compared with the same period last year, it said in a
statement on its website today.

The lender’s 2013 profit is seen at the “lower-end” of
estimates, because of slower Russian economic growth, Deputy
Chief Executive Officer Alexander Morozov said on a conference
call today.

RTS Tumbles

Russia’s gross domestic product growth slowed for six
quarters through June and was unchanged at 1.2 percent in the
three months to Sept. 30, Federal Statistics Service data show.
It will expand 1.8 percent in 2013, slowing from 3.4 percent
last year, according to the Economy Ministry.

The RTS Index retreated 0.9 percent to 1,404.31, the lowest
since Sept. 13. Russia’s equities have the cheapest valuations
among 21 emerging economies monitored by Bloomberg, with shares
on the benchmark trading at 4.3 times projected 12-month
earnings, compared with a multiple of 10.5 for the MSCI Emerging
Markets Index.